Help curing fruit woods for smoking

[T Rex]

We have a huge abundance of fruit/hardwood trees on the Island where I live and I was wondering if someone might steer me in the proper way of preparing the wood for use as smoking chunks.......

Securing (green) Apple, Cherry, Plum, Maple, Oak, Alder, etc.... is easy and mostly free however, I am not sure about the curing process, size to cut the wood into, do I leave the bark on, etc.....

I hope that I have placed this in the right spot and I thank you in advance for helping me out.

T Rex

[Syzygies]

Bark tastes odd, better to get the bark off. And the wood into chunks of the size you want. Other than that, just store in a dry place and let nature take its course. Should be good after a year, which passes faster than any of us would like.

[Firemonkey]

Aside from peach and oak, i have to buy my wood. I buy it in bulk when my travel happens to bring me close enough to someone who packages cooking wood, and bring it home with me. I get 2 free checked bags on the airplane, up to 50 pounds each, so that is 100 pounds of wood I can save shipping on.

The only thing I have ever bought that did not have the bark on it was a bag of apple chips once when I was cooking on a friends grill(it was all I could find) . All of the stuff I buy for myself is in chunks. The bulk boxes are cut to small fist sized chunks, while the retail packaged stuff is about half that size. Again, all of it has the bark on it. I have tried removing the bark to see if I can tell a difference, and I could not.

I am guessing the bark effect it is a volume thing, like when I am using 5 chunks of wood, but maybe only 1 or two is an outside cut with a layer of bark attached. So thats what? 1/10 or less of the volume of the wood?

I have seen that the commercial wood is cut into chunks before it is cured, and allowed to dry. It doesnt take long at all to dry out after it has been cut to small chunks, either. I picked up a load from Chigger Creek once that was freshly cut. When I got there, they had the chunks spread out on a large table, with 6 inch tall sides, and a chicken wire bottom, and were using a big fan to circulate air and dry it. The lady that packaged my order said to give it a week or so when I got home to let it finish drying. So the drying is not a science, and is going to depend alot on your circumstances.

I've seen more than a few people swear by smoking with freshly cut wood. I have used a bundle of recently trimmed peach twigs, tightly wrapped in a foil pounch when roasting a chicken once, and i have to admit, I did get a nice translucent blue smoke from it, and the chicken tasted awesome.

When i get peach wood from the neighbors tree, it is always the live branches up to 3 inches or so in diameter that he has pruned off. They are damp inside when I get them. I keep anything bigger around than my thumb, and cut them into chunks 3-4 inches long. I toss them all in a big tub, keep them in my garage, and they will cure in about 6-8 weeks here in FL. Those fairly small branches again have thin bark, so it stays on and I havent noticed any problem with it.

That said, the bark comes off very easily when the wood is nice and dry. Its a major pain to try and remove it when the wood is fresh, so if bark is an issue, I would just flake it off when you went to use the wood, and not worry about it now.

[T Rex]

Thanks guys, I am supposed to pick up an old Apple tree that blew over recently on a friends acreage. I am thinking that if I cut it into smaller chunks from the getgo, it should season faster..... and I will worry about the bark once it is dry.

Got to run, just put some nice Pork back ribs on..............

T Rex

[Conodo12]

Bark burns fast...

If your smokewood is dried, just add the amount of chunks you want with the bark on when you light your KK. By the time you come up to temp and heat-soak a bit, the bark will be burned off and you will be smoking with the light blue-grey translucent smoke that is perfect for BBQ!

[primeats]

With fruitwoods, in particular apple, the smaller branches have just a "skin " of bark on them. It would be pretty tough to peel that bark off, I've just been throwing it in the charcoal as is, same with my pear tree branches that Mother Nature has trimmed for me. Just my $.02.